EastEnders' Laila Morse is jetting off to amber list country Spain

EastEnders star Laila Morse was among the few passengers travelling to Spain from Gatwick Airport on Monday.

The actress, who plays Big Mo and whose real name is Maureen Oldman, was flying with EasyJet on their 12.50pm service to Murcia for a holiday, despite the country being on the amber list.

When asked whether she felt nervous about the traffic light system, the soap star, 75, said: ‘No.

I’ve gone by the book and read everything I need to do to go abroad.

‘But I saw you apparently don’t need a PCR test for Spain. Then I thought “suppose I get there and they say I do?”

‘So I paid £130 on Saturday to have the test done, a b****y job getting this thing for the QR passenger locator form and now they’re saying they don’t need it at the airport!

‘I’ve also got the thing saying I’ve got both the jabs on the NHS app but none of them wanted it!

They may want it in Spain hopefully or it’ll be a waste of time.’

She slammed the Government’s handling of the green list, adding: ‘I think myself they let Portugal go green because the football was out there and they wanted the money.

‘As soon as they got out there, spent the money and had a good time, they put it back on amber and got everyone back home.

It’s not fair.

‘Queues at Heathrow looked horrendous. All these people mixing from different flights. As soon as they heard about this variant from India, they should have stopped that.’ 

Earlier this year Spain’s tourism minister, Fernando Valdes Verelst, told an international summit held by the World Travel & Tourism Council in Mexico that the country will welcome back tourists – including those from the UK – in June.

He said: ‘Spain is going to be ready in June to use this digital certificate.

We are doing a pilot programme in May, in all our 46 airports.

‘We are going to give all these travellers that certainty. Spain is going to be ready in June to tell all travellers worldwide that you can visit us.’ 

Those travelling to amber list countries will be required to provide proof of a negative PCR test on arrival, taken within 72 hours of travel – or proof you have two Covid jabs. 

Within 72 hours of returning, the public will need to take an antigen/lateral flow test, and on return they must quarantine for ten days and take a PCR test on days two and eight. 

It is possible to shorten the isolation period by paying for another test on day five, but a person would still be required to take the day eight test.

 

In February, Laila spoke out about quitting EastEnders after more than 20 years as Big Mo, as she revealed she was moving to Spain. 

She spoke about her plans to exit the TV show in an interview with <a style="font-weight: bold;" target="_blank" class="class" website and said her motivation to leave was to 'spend more time in the sunshine'. 

She said: ‘I made the decision a while ago that I wanted to move to Spain so I let the team know that was my plan.

‘They said they would love to have me come back now and again when there was a need for Big Mo to return which was lovely to hear. 

EastEnders bosses reportedly agreed it was a good time for Laila to be written out of the show however, her character was not killed off and the door has been left open for her return.  

Laila added: ‘I’ll miss her but it won’t be forever – it’s hopefully more a ”hasta la vista” than goodbye!’